A Lot Can Happen in One Night
by lydiamartinis
Summary: Stydia one-shot - Lydia finds herself in a rather sticky predicament and calls on one estranged friend to help her out, none other than Stiles Stilinski. Things get weird quickly and the pair of teenagers find comfort in the strangest of places; each other. R&R if you like!


**_Authors Note: Neither of us own Teen Wolf or any of the characters, all rights are reserved to their respective owners. In no way are we affiliated with the show or the actors involved. We are just two crazy-ass fans who ship Stydia a whole bunch, we just own the writing shown here. Thanks!_  
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**2nd Stydia one-shot**

**Yooooo this is important! This is set AFTER 'Visiting', though I'll try to keep this short. Lydia threw a house party and everyone attended it; Scott, Stiles, the twins, some OC's and Allison. At the party, Lydia screamed and Aiden grabbed her to try and shut her up. Stiles stood up for her and told him to put her down, and then both twins, Aiden and Ethan, turned on Stiles. Ethan headbutted him and Aiden punched Stiles in the chest, fracturing two of his ribs and breaking a third. He has since recovered but it needs to be known in order for some things in this one-shot to make sense. Thanks! - Jay**

**Important (again)! Lydia's P.O.V is written by Mila and Stiles' P.O.V is written by Jay. Line breaks signify where the P.O.V's are swapped. This is adapted slightly from a post-post roleplay. Enjoy! **

* * *

**A Lot Can Happen in One Night**

**Chapter 1**

This was the second time in two weeks that Lydia Martin had found a dead body and not just by 'accident'. No, she had walked out into the woods in the middle of the night as if there was a magnet inside her that was leading her to the dead girl hanging from one of the trees. She didn't even know what she was doing as she left the safety of her house wearing nothing but her white nightgown, her long, slightly curly hair up in a messy ponytail with strands falling around her face. It was like someone else was moving her legs for her and she had no will of her own anymore, she didn't even register anything around her until she found herself standing in front of that tall tree, shivering from the cold, her bare feet covered in dirt.

For a moment she was just hoping that the girl wasn't dead, even though she knew deep down that there was no chance she was alive, even before she saw that her throat was slashed. A shiver went through her whole body as Lydia forced herself to look up at the dead body. She was fairly sure that the girl went to Beacon Hills High. If she wasn't mistaken, she was in the same history class Lydia took. But she couldn't remember her name, she had never spoken or paid much attention to her. She had always seemed reserved and not especially outgoing. Lydia had never been interested in getting to know her.

Lydia's cold fingers closed tighter around the phone she was holding in her left hand and she slowly looked down at it, relieved that she had it with her. If she hadn't been texting a friend when the sudden urge to leave the house overwhelmed her, she probably wouldn't have had it with her now. Scrolling down her contact list, she tried to focus on figuring out who to call. 911 was a given and the first call she automatically made, but she felt like she had to talk to someone else. Someone like...Stiles. Lydia scrolled down to his name and pushed 'dial', hoping he was going to pick up despite the late time. But if anyone of her friends would, it was him. As she waited for him to answer, she let her green eyes move up again and slowly grimaced in disgust at the sight. The girl's clothes were bloody, as was the rope that was wrapped around her neck and attached to the tree. Lydia had fought off the initial instinct to scream as she had first looked at her face and the pair of dead, empty eyes. Now all that hit her was a small wave of nausea that she tried to distract herself from by pondering why anyone would have a reason to do something like that. It didn't look like the work of a werewolf, but then again she didn't know the alpha pack well enough. Maybe they preferred to go all 'serial killer style' on their victims. Stiles finally picked up his phone and it felt surprisingly good to hear his voice. It wasn't like Lydia Martin was scared of being alone in the woods after dark, but … well, she didn't have a good feeling about it either. Actually, she had a lot of negative feelings mixed up inside her right now, and one of them was definitely a very distinct feeling of doom. It made her nervous.

* * *

Getting up in the middle of the night wouldn't be a normal thing for someone to do, less they were an insomniac who couldn't sleep. Normally, Stiles Stilinski would sleep through and through until around six thirty or so in the morning. Getting up that early gave him enough leverage to shower quickly, dry his hair, dress himself and gather his things for school. If he felt particularly tired (or knew he would be the next morning), he'd prepare his school bag the night before, so that he could have a lie in. Normally.

The weekend hadn't been a normal one at all. The party had gone to shit, that much was obvious, Stiles spent hours in a hospital (a place that he hated with good reason), and then had to rest at home while in intense pain. Luckily his father allowed him to miss school the following day, but that didn't mean much. Stiles had been awoken in the early hours of Monday morning.

The bzzt-bzzt sound of his large, flat phone vibrating on a wooden surface jolted the moderately heavy sleeper awake – or he would have been heavily sleeping if it hadn't been for the fractured, splintered bones in his chest. He had been awaking himself in set periods of time since he couldn't get much sleep, and was strangely thankful when he heard his phone vibrate beside him. Stiles rolled over, groaning loudly (though still careful not to wake his slumbering father in the next bedroom over), hopeful to see something not too worrying. Texts in the middle of the night weren't good, not when he was this knee-deep in a supernatural world. But, what was that? His phone vibrated again, and on the third round of jittering, Stiles had picked the thing up, looked at the illuminated screen, and pressed the phone to his ear. No text, just a call… strange. Almost.

_Incoming Call – Lydia Martin_. Now, that would have been strange for the normal teenager, but Stiles was used to odd ball antics by now. He answered the phone immediately once it clicked who it was on the other end trying to reach him, through the haze of a drugged up brain of course.

The phone call was… odd indeed. It fit the circumstances perfectly considering the strange events that had played out in the past few weeks. Stiles would have most likely spread the conversation out hadn't it been so urgent – or rather, the girl on the other end of the line sounding so scared. Cool, collected Lydia Martin was nowhere to be heard. Not tonight. In between her words, Stiles could hear her tiny gasps of air and the dull whistle of wind as it rushed past the microphone in her mobile. He swallowed, nervously, every chance that he got, since his throat was devilishly dry.

Half way through the conversation, Stiles had gotten up, and was about to get himself changed. Lydia had explained to him that she'd randomly 'woken up' in the woods, phone clutched in her hand, barefoot, with – not so surprisingly – a dead body hanging from a tree in front of her. Stiles, although sleepy and heavily slowed down on his meds, could imagine the dead girl swinging from the tree in the faint breeze, which played with his squeamish stomach like a cat with a chew toy. He felt sick slightly, but he, right then in the moment, couldn't decide whether that was the vision of the dead girl, his meds, or the fact that Lydia sounded so scared. When she was scared, it scared him, natural, really.

There was no way in hell that Stiles wasn't going to do something about this, messed up ribs or not. His own health and safety went out of the window whenever Lydia Martin was in distress. Actually, when any of his friends were in distress – but her especially. He wouldn't get up at almost one in the morning for Derek or even Scott. If this was Scott on the other end, Stiles would tell the teenager to stuff it where the sun doesn't shine. But this was Lydia, _the Lydia_, the girl who'd accompanied him to his mothers' grave last week and had actually invited him to her party. Face-to-face, too. He'd do anything for that girl, and getting up in the middle of the night, getting dressed, sneaking out of his own house to pick her up in the dead of night only proved that.

Stiles had, with some difficulty, managed to get himself into some clothes. Albeit he couldn't move too quickly because of his ribs and his father sleeping in the adjacent room; he went for the closest clothes to him – a pair of skinny pants, jeans or dark chinos, he couldn't tell in the dark, a pure white tee, a flannel shirt to go over the top, greeny-bluey-grey in colour, and his best pair of sneakers. Well, the best pair he could run in. He had a feeling he'd be doing some running tonight. Stiles picked up his phone again and resumed talking to Lydia on the other end of the line, keen to make sure that she understood he was there for her, if not physically then down the phone was enough. He tried to remain as calm as he could, bringing up jokes and trying to remain as comical as normal. Inside, however, he was panicking. What if she wasn't alone out there?

Was he really going to do this?

…_Of course he was._

"Call me back in five." He instructed her, and then hung up and proceeded to descend his stairs. Before leaving, Stiles grabbed his keys, a hoodie that he wore when he had to make trips to the store nearby or when it was cold and raining outside, and, believe it or not, a greyish coloured cap to wear. To cover up his bed hair, mostly, because he simply didn't have time to make an effort tonight. Normally if Lydia asked to see him, he'd dress in his best clothes, wear his best footwear, put that waxy stuff in his hair and steal some of his dad's best, most expensive cologne to impress her. But this wasn't your conventional meet up. No, he was picking her up… from the woods… in the middle of the night. Great.

Stiles quickly placed the cap onto his head and sneakily, but with speed, exited his house. The cap he wore was twisted trademark-style around, backwards; so that the peak was at the back of his neck. He crossed his front yard, ignoring the pathway totally to cross the dewy, wet grass, to his jeep. He climbed inside, hoodie and mobile in hand, keys in the other, and made a stupidly speedy, rather loud getaway. He was sure that he woke his father when he got to the end of his street, because he could see the tell-tale light flicker on in the mirror above his windshield. He couldn't go back, though. If his dad thought he was going to leave Lydia alone in the woods like this, then he was dead wrong.

Lydia had called Stiles half way through his drive to the woods, or where she described, and gave him directions as best as she could. Stiles followed closely, careful to drive cautiously with his damaged ribs hindering certain movements. He couldn't turn quickly, he couldn't look behind like he normally would to reverse; and instead he had to use those stupid mirrors. He hated those mirrors.  
"Kay, kay I'm here. Tell me where- Jesus it's freezing!" He stuttered mid-sentence as he climbed out of the warm insides of his jeep into the cold, unforgiving outside world. Before him stood the towering trees, fading off into a thickening blackness that would only be seen in a horror movie. Well, it wasn't very good that Stiles was a wimp when watching horror movies, because he was definitely dreading this. Before locking his jeep, he grabbed the hoodie he'd brought with him for Lydia, and set off into the woods, making little whimpers here and there as he almost tripped over the branches and brush on the ground.

"A-Are you alright?" Stiles mumbled down the phone, still talking to Lydia as he traversed the darkness to her supposed location. He was shivering by now, and was tempted to put on the hoodie he'd brought with him, but no. He was saving it for Lydia, he couldn't wear it when it belonged to her now. The further he got into the woods, the more that the feeling of safety dissipated. Eight minutes deep into the forest, the panic was coming through his stutter, shivery voice as he listened and replied to Lydia's directions and please to 'Get here faster' but Stiles could only go so fast with messed up ribs.

* * *

It wasn't that Lydia wasn't thankful that Stiles had offered to pick her up. She was relieved, because she was too cold to walk all the way back home and since her mother was spending the night somewhere out of town with her new lover, there weren't many options left. She could have tried Allison, but even though the girls were close, Lydia didn't feel like bothering her in the middle of the night and asking her to pick her up. So she was really, incredibly grateful that Stiles was free and willing to drive out here when he had most likely already been sleeping, but did it have to take him so long? Lydia was pacing around the tree, not straying far away from the dead body, but constantly moving, because her limbs were already feeling way too numb from the cold. There was a small, stinging pain going through her left foot every time she stepped on it and as she lifted it to look at her sole, she noticed a small, bleeding cut, probably from a sharp rock or something. Fantastic. Ignoring the slight pain, she kept walking around in circles, carefully setting her bare feet down one after another on the dirty leaves as she tried not to think about all the bugs that were crawling around the woods at night. At least it was too dark to see the dirt and insects she was stepping on.

She kept reminding herself that at least she wasn't naked this time, even though a very short and low cut, white night gown wasn't much more and it was certainly not doing much against the harsh cold November air. She wished that she had put on one of these boring, warm pajamas with long sleeves, the ones that actually covered a lot more than just your torso. She would have been freezing a little less now. Stiles was trying to keep her entertained on the phone, which was cute, but doing nothing against the cold either. With her phone tucked in between her head and her shoulder, Lydia used both her hands to continuously rub against her arms, seeking the slight warmth that the friction created. But it wasn't enough to keep her warm and her skin felt like ice under her fingers. She accidentally dropped her phone at least two times during the whole conversation, and picked it up with a small curse and shaking fingers each time. At some point, she didn't say much in response to Stiles' jokes anymore and he was left with the sound of her teeth chattering from the cold.

All her irritation about him taking so long was quickly blown away when she heard the sound of a car. A second later, she could see the headlights of Stiles' jeep approaching. She ended the phone call with Stiles, slightly surprised that he was here before the police, and held her phone between her freezing fingers as she waited for him to get out of the car. She could barely see him in the dark, but he was wearing a cap that she could only inwardly shake her head about. As he walked towards her, she briefly looked down on herself, feeling strangely exposed although she was at least wearing a very short night gown and Stiles had seen her in .. well... a lot less than that before. It was one of these unpleasant memories that Lydia Martin tried to permanently erase from her mind, the night he had found her stumbling through the woods completely naked, with leaves stuck to her hair. This time was actually a lot less worse.

"Hey," she muttered quietly, her limbs trembling from the freezing cold. This was actually the first time she saw him since her 'great' party on Saturday when Aiden had gone batshit crazy on him, which had caused her to put an end to her short lived fling with the werewolf. But she still wasn't sure what exactly had happened, because she had been strangely out of it for some time, barely registering what was going on around her. People had told her a lot of different stories, some of them a lot more bizarre than others, but most of them had one thing in common: Stiles had apparently taken a stand for her against the twins, sometime during or after her screaming like crazy. That was both sweet and incredibly stupid of him, but it was more than anyone else would have done for her. And even now, as he made his way over to her, just the human that he was, she immediately felt a lot safer than before.

* * *

Stumbling around in the dark wasn't exactly something that someone could have gained any skill in. Every three or four steps, a branch that had snapped off from a tree that had landed on the ground seemed to reach out and snag the bottom of Stiles' chinos; skinny, bony little bark-covered fingers grabbing at his ankles, determined to trip him. With one hand holding the phone he had to his ear and the other clutching onto the hoodie he'd brought, he didn't have enough limbs to extend them and give himself some more balance. He almost tripped over properly a few times, and then made it habit to take large, high-kneed steps over the brush and debris on the ground. He was half paying attention to the surroundings, half focusing on Lydia's voice, which was a source of guidance through the eerie blackness in the forest. Stiles looked up, through the twiggy, stringy branches of the trees against the dark sky, searching for the moon. This would have been bad if this had all happened on a full moon – he realised probably far too late – and immediately began looking for it. He started to panic when he couldn't see it. The moon didn't just disappear—oh, he found it, and a large, strewn out but relieved sigh left his lips in a puff of mist. Only a half moon tonight, that was good. Sort of… he still wasn't going to stay here long. He was freezing.

Lydia ended the phone call rather abruptly. He didn't understand at first that she'd spotted the headlights move behind the tree trunks and cast a white light across the place, he'd even gone so far as to assume that her phone died. He didn't want to think that she had been dragged away by her ankles into the depth of the forest, or that she hung up because he was annoying her. Either of those options seemed as bad as the other at that point. A few more cautious, carefully-trodden steps later, Stiles leaned against a thin, scraggly tree with his upper right arm. His hand returned his phone to his back pocket, and then rose to his heaving, aching chest. He held his ribs with a shaky but quiet whimper, and tried to regain some strength that he might have had. That was when he heard the soft 'Hey' that would belong to the one and only girl he was looking for.

"Sh-hey," Stiles returned to her, startled and about to exclaim profanities. He flinched against the tree, his large eyes widening in horror as he imagined a huge, red-eyed wolf man whispering 'hey' to him before slaughtering him like a little piggy to be eaten. Lydia moved closer, and Stiles could make out the frizzy outline of her hair, and he sighed again in relief. Thank God. For a second, Stiles Stilinski stood there, leaning against the tree, breathing shakily, clutching his damaged chest with one hand to try and supress the pain there. He pulled his lips into his mouth to stop his teeth chattering, but he ended up chewing on those inadvertently too. The only solution was to get out of the cold. But, first things first:

"I b-brought you this," Stiles stuttered, breath coming out misty once more. He extended his other arm, hoodie in hand, towards Lydia timidly. Inside, he tried to conceal his whimpers by baring his teeth to the cold, as if he'd witnessed a horrific scene in a gory movie. "Its my big hoodie. I say big, it was my dads… b-but, you can have it." Stiles gave the hoodie to Lydia, which he'd been trying to keep warm by holding it close to his body.

The next order of business was to establish if she was okay. By now, the pain had begun to die slightly in his chest, but was by no means eradicated as of yet.

"You okay?" Stiles asked with a shaky voice full of concern. He then pushed himself away from the tree into an upright position again, and took a small, miniscule step towards her. He looked down at her from his taller position, eyes barely showing in the dead light of the forest and moon light above, with worry etched into his pale expressions. "Where is it—she?" Stiles said, looking over Lydia's shoulder as she was now facing his neck and chest. He could see above her head across the forest or area infront of him; but there was no body. He wished that he had night vision. Blinking, Stiles was about to give up looking for it, when he remembered that Lydia said that the girl had been hanging. Gross, he'd admit, but he looked up and began searching higher for it. There, about five or so metres away, partly concealed by dying leaves, drooping branches and the darkness itself, was the girl. Legs were limp. She wasn't moving, apart from the gentle sway caused by the night time breeze. Stiles wasn't as calm as he wished he'd been, and seeing her like that did scare him. He flinched; badly, and reached forwards to grab Lydia for support as he stumbled slightly.

"J-Jesus! What is this, the freakin' predators' handy work?!" Stiles felt slightly sick being this close to the body. As the wind changed direction, the smell of dampened, almost rotting clothes and flesh filled his nostrils. He almost choked on the scent, but then the soft smell of Lydia's hair caught his attention and he was brought back again. His hand had found her lower arm, now wrapped in his hoodie, and he had held on as if he was about to drag her to the depths of hell. His large eyes darted from Lydia's saddened, frightened silhouette to the body and back again, and finally, he stopped looking at the dead girl altogether.

"Damn, Lydia," he mumbled to her, his hand shaking against her. "Wh- should we… call someone? Leave?" For the moment he was too drugged up and hazy to be the brains, but he hoped that she would say leave. Someone else could find the body and report it to the police; joggers ran through here all the time, didn't they? Exactly – this could be someone else's find.

* * *

As Stiles came to stand in front of her, Lydia found herself glancing up at his cap once more, briefly wondering if he was wearing it because he thought it made him look cool or to simply cover up the mess that his hair most likely was after he had gotten out of bed. She had a feeling that it was the latter, but with Stiles Stilinski, you could never be entirely sure. Either way, it reminded her of the mess that her own hair was, even though it was tied up loosely in a ponytail. Strands and pieces of hair were falling out on all sides around her face and on her neck. On top of that, she wasn't wearing any make-up, but it was too dark to notice the lack of rosy blush on her cheeks and mascara on her lashes anyways.

Her brows furrowed as she watched him lean against a tree, his hand moving to his chest as if he was in pain or just really, really out of breath. She didn't say anything though until he took a step towards her, offering her the hoodie he was carrying with him. She had been wondering why he wasn't wearing it, since he seemed cold too, but she didn't actually think he had brought it for her. Of course now it made sense, because he was as kind to her as always. "Thanks." There was no way in hell that she would refuse to wear the hoodie, no matter what it looked like, hell, she didn't even care much what it smelled like, she just wanted to get a little warmer. Her cold fingers lightly brushed over his as she took the hoodie from him, her green eyes briefly gazing into his coffee brown ones. Then she pulled the fabric over her head, realizing that it really was big. The sleeves were way too long, but it was more than welcome, because she could warm her frozen fingers in them.

She responded to Stiles' question with a simple, slow nod. Yes, she was okay. Cold, shocked and more than ready to curl up somewhere warm, but other than that, fine. She was about to answer his question about where the body was when he spotted it himself. She turned a little to face the same direction he did and felt him flinch and stumble next to her. Almost automatically, she extended her left hand and grabbed his right arm beside her to keep him steady next to her, and, maybe just a little, also to hold on to him at the same time. Her fingers slightly tightened around the fabric of his sweater as he kept holding on to her, obviously frightened by the sight above them. He was just as shocked as she had been about twenty minutes ago, because a dead girl from school hanging from a tree really wasn't the nicest sight. But as she had been waiting for him to show up, Lydia had gathered the courage to take a closer look at the body and realized a few things. "Did you notice," she began, now fiddling around with her phone in her right hand since her left one was still around Stiles' arm, "that she has been strangled and her throat has been slashed?" Lydia turned on the flashlight of her phone, holding it up so the light hit the dead body, which actually made the sight a lot worse. She slightly grimaced, but repeatedly told herself that she had seen gore multiple times before in horror movies, at least whenever she had been forced to watch some. "Each individually would have been enough to kill her," she concluded, slowly lowering the hand that was holding her phone, letting the light trail down the girl's body. "No claw marks."

She turned the flashlight off again and faced Stiles, even though she couldn't see his expression very well in the dark. "I already called 911," she told him, as if it was obvious and as a matter of fact, it sort of was. Who wouldn't do that upon finding a dead body? Did he think she had only called him? That would have been ridiculous. "They should be here...any second." She turned to look over her shoulder as she heard the sounds of more cars and only a few minutes later, the forest was lit up like a Christmas tree with the lights of police cars and an ambulance quickly approaching.

* * *

If Stiles was alone right now, glancing up at the swinging dead girl like he had been, then he would have most definitely either puked, fainted, or most likely, both. The wind, although constantly changing direction and holding the sweet, intoxicating scent of Lydia's hair across his face, still somehow reeked of dead flesh. The body couldn't have been more than two days old – it just couldn't have. But, luckily, he wasn't alone out here, and neither was Lydia. Lydia was almost guaranteed to have the stronger stomach of the two and would be generally more athletic if they had to suddenly run for their lives, Stiles knew that as fact, but for once they both seemed to be in the exact same boat. They were keeping each other afloat and hopeful in this dark, scary forest, and for a moment, Stiles couldn't comprehend how much that emotionally meant to him. It was like Lydia had just cashed in ten thousand poker chips to the Lydia-and-Stiles foundation and he was suddenly richer in every way possible, but with his head out of the game and the cold numbing both his extremities and his mind altogether, he simply didn't understand it.

Well, he kind of did when he felt the cold sensation of soft fingers brushing against his hand as Lydia took his gift for her. Looking at the body, however, seemed to stamp out any kind of sentimentality that there was between the two teenagers. Stiles didn't know what he'd done; perhaps taken a tiny step back, only to catch his heel on a fallen log of sorts, but he felt as if gravity was claiming him. He stumbled, hard, and as if drawn to each other, the teenagers extended arms until they had a firm grip on one another. More so that they wouldn't drag each other down to the cold, hard, dead-leaf covered ground than anything else; but again, Stiles was a bit too freaked for this all to register emotionally. Had he been pain-killer and cold-free right then, he probably would have swooned into her arms at any moment just because of the contact she'd made. There was a great deal of self-balancing to be made before Stiles could safely let go of Lydia's arm without falling, yet he didn't. He held on, just as long as she did, and gazed up above into the branches as Lydia spoke.

Blinking, Stiles realized that he'd been seeing or rather hearing similar things to what Lydia was currently describing. Being the son of the only sheriff in town gave you privileges; you got to hear all of the awesome crime stories. Not too good if you were squeamish, but Stiles had years of practice. He'd memorized all of the code names and secret little words that the force had to talk discreetly with his father about things. As always, Stiles had sussed it out and managed to come up with a witty answer before the conversation finished. Normally, that would earn him a slightly too-hard slap to the back of the head and a warning to 'stop solving the crimes'. At least Stiles knew what kind of area careers-wise he was going to go into, after his dad of course.

"Y-yeah, my dad was talking about something similar about a week ago." Stiles paused and watched with a distasteful face as the light showed the gritty and gross details of the bloodied body. "Strangling and slashing isn't exactly what a wolf-man would do," he thought verbally, obviously. "If you have claws, what's the point in doing all this? My dad… he said that the county over from ours had found a body on the outskirts of town. Actually, on the big road heading to Beacon Hills. Can't remember for sure but I think he mentioned something about slicing and dicing," Stiles turned his face away from the body, more so down into Lydia's direction. He used Lydia to shield the body from his view. "Kinda like missus blair-witch-project up there." Was he really suggesting that this place had a serial killer on their hands...? Perhaps. Anything was possible in this freakish hell hole town.

Hearing that Lydia had already called 911 was both a relief and a worry. Relieving because this would be sorted and they hadn't much reason to be scared anymore, but why didn't that sentence take away all of the fear? Stiles was scared that whoever or whatever did this was still out here, yes, but right now was more scared of his dad coming to find him in the middle of the woods at one in the morning with the girl he'd been talking about in his sleep for the past nine or ten years. Not a very good thing to go on his personal track record, huh?

"Could've at least waited till I got you outta here first," Stiles mumbled, looking to the right into the trees as he released his tight grip on his hoodie that Lydia was wearing a little. "My dad is gonna kill me if we don't get killed first." His breath came out in one huge puff of mist, and he turned his face to look back down at Lydia again. He brought his free hand up to the crook of his elbow and hugged his chest closely, trying to keep some warmth to himself. The distant sounds of sirens became louder, and Stiles found himself inadvertently shuffling closer to Lydia in hopes that she would back him up in this situation. Two arguments against one angry sheriff stood a better chance than one measly plea to a worried and pissed off father.

* * *

Lydia was shifting from one foot to the other, trying to fight off the harsh cold. But even though she was wearing Stiles' big sweater now, she was still shivering violently because she had been out in the woods for quite a while, wearing nothing but a thin night gown that certainly didn't do much to keep a girl warm in the cold air of a November night. Without much hesitation at all, she took another step towards Stiles, closing the remaining space between them and wrapping her other hand around his arm to, clinging to him and the warmth his body radiated. Even if it wasn't much considering that it was freezing cold outside, it seemed better than nothing. Actually, right now anything was better than nothing. She tightened her grip around his arm as the sirens got louder and the lights of cars came closer, pressing herself against him, letting out a slightly frustrated sigh. To be honest, his father killing Stiles was probably the least of her worries right now. Lydia didn't know the sheriff well, she had seen him a few times around and spoken to him a couple of times, like that one time when Stiles and him had found her naked in the woods, but he seemed nice enough. And right now, it really didn't matter if he was going to tear Stiles' head off for being in the woods next to a dead body at 1am, as long as they could get to someplace warm soon. Apart from that, Stiles was really damn good at talking his way out of bad situations and if that wasn't enough, then there was still a dead body that would provide a great amount of distraction. The sheriff wouldn't even have much time to deal with two teenagers right now.

Unconsciously rubbing her hands up and down Stiles' arm for warmth, Lydia gazed into the dark of the night, waiting. In the distance, she saw the lights of flashlights approaching. "A serial killer," she muttered towards Stiles, her teeth chattering from the cold, "that's fantastic." No wonder she had a bad feeling about this. Maybe there weren't any werewolves involved, maybe this was just a completely human psychopath's work. Maybe it had nothing to do with Scott, the alphas and whatever else was going on. Maybe Beacon Hills was just a town where bad things happened all the time. It wasn't a pleasant thought, especially since the dead girl was around their age, but there was still a feeling of doom inside her that she couldn't quite explain. Just like she couldn't explain why on earth she had actually walked all the way out here from her warm bedroom, wearing nothing but a night gown and being pretty much out of it until she'd found the body.

The footsteps were coming closer now and there were voices too. Before long, the sheriff was standing in front of them, big flashlight in hands, with a handful of other officers right behind him. Lydia couldn't help but notice how the older man furrowed his brows upon spotting his son. Hell, she could even see the look of surprise on his face even though the only light came from the few flashlights. The strawberry blonde still had her arms wrapped around Stiles', but she loosened her grip on him a little. "Stiles...what are you doing here?" The sheriff's voice was a mix out frustration, curiosity and concern, for which Lydia couldn't really blame him. This wasn't the first time he was running into his son at the scene of a crime. She remained quiet, letting Stiles answer the question that was directed at him, but she felt the sheriff's eyes on her too and before he got an answer from his son, he nodded his head at her. "I'm going to call your mother."

"She's in New York," came Lydia's truthful answer. "I'm fine... really." She tried to stop shaking from the cold, but gave up when it only made her shake harder against Stiles who she was still somewhat clinging to. His father didn't seem too happy with her response, but he believed her and nodded slightly, looking from his son to the girl that was holding on to him. Then he let out a sigh.

* * *

Bitter, deathly freezing cold like this wasn't uncommon in Beacon Hills around November and the latter months of the year; but for some reason, Stiles felt as if his limbs could drop off at any given moment had someone or something nudged or prodded him in his joints. Was it just the weather, or was something else making Stiles shake uncontrollably? He felt cold beyond belief, somehow similar yet uncannily unfamiliar at the same time. His large teeth were chattering loudly in his mouth, beneath his pale, colour-sapped lips, sounding like he'd had a family of woodpeckers stationed in his gob for weeks. His fingers; on one hand were curled tightly into a fist to preserve warmth, and on the other, were needlessly clasped around Lydia's clothing – or rather, his clothing, only she was wearing it now. Stiles' frightened, alert eyes were now cast upwards, looking through the trees at the looming headlights that flashed eerily through the trees like they were prison bars, but he had been looking elsewhere a moment before.

Lydia had shuffled that tiny bit closer. Actually, the fact of the matter was, she'd gotten as close as physics on Earth would allow to her companion, obviously to steal or share his bodily warmth. Stiles, of course, didn't mind that one bit. He'd been formulating a multitude of masterful plans to get this close to Lydia since grade five (previously he was too afraid to even think about her in case she caught her staring at him… lame), so this was quite the experience. He didn't even have to do much, only show up and be her knight in shining armour for the night. Awesome, in his mind. As soon as Stiles had felt the beginnings of little fingers grip around his arm and the unfamiliar feeling of soft weight being pressed against his arm, clinging, pulling, holding on as if he was the only source of hope in these dank woods, he'd looked down to see what was the matter. Normally, Lydia Martin wouldn't bother touching him. She'd barely bother having a conversation with him that didn't involve werewolves or homework.

And even though the cold was mind numbing and he should have had a thousand more important and urgent things on his mind – like the dead girl swinging from her neck on the tree behind them both – all Stiles could think about was how Lydia, the girl, was holding onto him and now rubbing her hand up and down his sleeve as if to create needed friction and warmth. Even if the sole purpose of that action was to keep her perfectly painted dainty little fingers from dropping off, Stiles was reading into it. And, as many people knew, Scott mostly, Stiles' overactive mind tended to wander into the inappropriate and pervy quickly and without warning. He'd thought about those hands of hers doing so many different things, so many different things indeed, and in the darkness if it was possible to have night vision, Lydia would have noticed the pink blush spread across his cheeks like a rosy wildfire.

'A serial killer,' the words came suddenly from the silence and brought Stiles' mind back to his body again. He swallowed and took his eyes away from where he'd been admiring his baggy sweater draped over her frame in the blackness (and of course associating it with the day dreams he'd had of her wearing his clothes before), and snapped his eyes to the ever increasing sounds and lights that gained on them with haunting speed. Being reminded of the danger they were in and the undeniably shitty situation, Stiles felt the warm fuzzy feeling inside of him dissipate as the crunch-snap!-crunch of breaking twigs and dead leaves being trampled on came closer. Stiles tilted his body slightly so that he was partly shielding Lydia from the wind that blew, and partly so that he could share the needed warmth with her. He realized it would have been much more effective to wrap his arms around her shoulders and pull her into his chest, but of course, they weren't at that stage just yet. Oh, how he yearned to do something similar to that… how he yearned to hold her like Jackson once did. Instead, though, he curled his fingers around the base of the baggy clothing she wore and held on tighter, leaning into her just as much as she leaned into him.

Suddenly, like a bat out of hell, a large figure stood before the two teenagers and Stiles' eyes widened at the impending feeling of danger. Then, a light as bright as the sun and more shone directly into his eyes and he slammed them shut, lifted his free hand to cover the light from his eyes, and he turned his face into Lydia's hair. That hurt, just when the light caught his retina at precisely the right moment. It was only natural to turn away. The figure lowered the light and shone it upwards, creating a luminous glow that illuminated everyone's faces; Stiles' pale, confused face, Lydia's pained frown, and the Sheriff's disappointed look.

'Stiles… what are you doing here?' It was a simple enough question. And yet, Stiles' tongue tied itself into knots as Lydia loosened her grip on him and he stumbled over his words like a baby taking his first steps.

"O-Oh, y-you know… just…" But it was too late, seemingly, since his father nodded disapprovingly at Lydia and spoke with a tone-deaf coldness. Calling her mother would be the responsible thing.

However, Lydia's answer was something that Stiles wasn't expecting at all. His caramel brown eyes snapped from his dad's face and he looked, frowning confusedly, at Lydia as if she'd spoken in tongues. And even more so at her next words. She was shaking dramatically now. She'd been trying to keep herself still in front of Stiles' dad, but ultimately the shivers had gotten the better of her and had overwhelmed her to a point where she vibrated like a cell phone on silent mode. The frown on Stiles' face, mixed with the shock of hearing she was pretty much alone again family-wise, faded and he sighed quietly, almost disappointed. His arm, still shaking from the cold, tugged out of Lydia's loose grip and he brought it up and over her shoulders. He pulled her close, so that she didn't have to be so cold, and he looked up at his dad.

"She's not fine." He spoke, seriously now. He even supressed the stutters in his grave tone. "She found a body. Behind us, in the tree. Dad, I need to take her home… she's freezing." The older man had looked above his son's head and had shone the light onto the grotesque body hanging from the tree. He confirmed what his son had said, sighed again, and called behind his shoulder to his force members: "Over here… we got ourselves another body." He didn't even sound that surprised.

Turning back to his son and the teenage girl being kept securely beneath his arm, his tone fell from extremely cold and annoyed to disappointed but some-what warm.

"You found the body?" The Sheriff asked, to Lydia, nodding at her. Stiles sighed aloud, showing that he was obviously annoyed with this already. Lydia was freezing, he was freezing, just let them go already!

* * *

Lydia Martin hated everything about this situation. She hated the fact that there was the body of a girl from high school hanging from a tree like it was some sort of wild animal that had been sacrificed and hung up for display instead of a human being. She hated that she had been out here for over twenty minutes wearing nothing but her thin nightgown and she hated the fact that she was barefoot. The dirt on her feet from walking all the way from her house to the woods was disgusting and she just wanted to take a shower and wash it all off. A very hot, steamy shower, because she was freezing and now shaking violently due to the cold, and she hated that too, just like she hated the way the sheriff and some of the other cops were looking at her. Sure, they didn't know what to think of a barefoot girl in the woods at this time, miraculously finding a body, but it was annoying to be looked at as if she was crazy (even if maybe she was). She hated being the damsel in distress and she hated the fact that she once again had to call Stiles to come 'rescue her'. But more than anything, she hated that stupid cap on his head and that she was now wearing his oversized sweater for some much needed warmth. Lydia wasn't the kind of girl who enjoyed wearing her boyfriend's clothes, she had only worn Jackson's sweater a couple of times after he left and now she was standing here, practically forced to wear something that belonged to Stiles. It was absolutely horrible and god, she hated it. And when Stiles reached out and put his arm over her shoulders in a protective gesture, she hated that too. That, and the goofy look she knew he had on his face as he tried to explain to his father why he was here, even if she couldn't clearly see his expression in the dark. And maybe she even hated herself a little for knowing Stiles' facial expressions so damn well by now.

Yet she was standing here, feeling like she was on top of the world because a boy had rushed here to the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the freaking night, just to make sure she was okay. Jackson might have done the same, but he would have shown up in a pissed off mood, asking her what the hell she was doing out here this late and complaining about having to come and take her all the way home in his car. Stiles didn't seem mad or angry, he had even brought her a sweater. A sweater that she hated. Or maybe she didn't absolutely hate it, but she felt like she had the right to, just like she felt like she had the right to be annoyed by Stiles' goofy expression and the way he almost clumsily pulled her closer. But if she was annoyed by it, why did she keep her face on him trying to make out any features of his expression in the dark of the night as if seeing only a glimpse of that goofy smile would make this whole situation a lot better? And why did his body against hers make her feel like … she wasn't sure what it made her feel like, but it was something. All of this felt like it was something, she just couldn't figure out what it was or maybe she was too stubborn to.

"Yes, I found the body. I was … sleep walking." It was the only thing she could come up with, because what else was she supposed to say? Slightly shrugging, she tried to keep the chattering of her teeth at a minimum. "I'm sorry, I don't know anything." The sheriff looked like he wanted to ask a few more follow-up questions, but after a moment of hesitation seemed to decide against it and just nodded. "Alright." Facing his son, he slowly nodded again, keeping the flash light low. "Take her home. Looks like I'm going to have a lot of work tonight, so..." The sheriff briefly glanced up at the dead body behind them. "You can change my bed for her if she wants to stay the night." He flashed his son a look that was supposed to say 'don't get any funny ideas and sleep together in one room', but since it was pretty dark, he wasn't sure that Stiles got it. He could only hope that he did.

Lydia's grip around Stiles' arm loosened upon being told they could leave and she slowly let go of him altogether. Taking a few steps forward, she squinted her eyes in the darkness trying to see where his jeep was, because there was no way she was going to spend any longer than necessary out here in this cold. She was tired, shaking and quite honestly slightly shocked by finding a dead girl, even if she seemed to keep her "cold, lifeless exterior" perfectly well. Stiles knew what was up, that she inwardly wasn't as calm. And if he didn't before, he now definitely got the idea that she wanted to leave as soon as possible as she started to walk straight towards his car, hoping he would follow.

* * *

Well, luckily for the freezing teens, the Sheriff didn't spend too much longer dwelling on unpleasant topics. Sleep walking didn't make very much sense seeing as though he'd never heard of someone walking miles in the middle of the night into the woods – plus coincidentally finding a body way out here made it all the more creepier – but he supposed it wasn't totally unheard of. In a bizarre circumstance, this kind of nuttiness was somehow believable. Stiles, on the other hand, very much unlike his complacent father, knew that he simply refused to believe that such weird goings on in the town would all be linked. Why was it that the same group of kids were always stuck in the middle? Why did the trouble wrap back around onto three or four main people? Obviously the sheriff was just ignorant, stupid, or he really didn't care. Stiles, the person who looked up to the man the most, though, even agreed with those thoughts. In this sense, his dad was a stupid moron. But he was also the dad, the primary money lender and the carer, so Stiles loved him unconditionally, even if he showed it in more of a friendly way as opposed to a father-son way.

Right then, though, there didn't seem to be very much love between them at all. Stiles looked up at his guardian and parent as if he was the daftest, stupidest thing to have walked on the surface of the planet. As soon as the older man turned to face his spawn after briefly listening to Lydia, though, the look of idiocy on his maw dropped totally and he lifted his eyebrows in a blank expression. It was evident and obvious to anyone in the area that the force were going to be up late tonight, doing what they did in said situations. Honestly, Stiles wanted to stay here and try to help out, maybe get a chance to poke the dead body even though that was totally, one hundred per cent disrespectful. However he knew all too well that his responsibilities lied elsewhere tonight – plus, the cold was about to make him crack his teeth from the amount he was chattering them. He had to get himself and Lydia somewhere warm, fast, and then somewhere where Lydia could get some shut-eye. But where, exactly?

The Sheriff seemed to have an answer for that too, because just as Lydia and Stiles turned to set off in the opposite direction, away from the carnage and the deep, dark forest, his father spoke again. This time, suggesting something pretty crazy and weird for Stilinski standards (and those standards were WAY out there). Essentially straight after the Sheriff had hinted that she could stay at their humble, all-male-two-bedroom abode, Stiles swallowed his tongue and almost choked. A girl? Staying at his house? Over night? Lydia?! He'd had countless dreams that began the same way, but quite obviously those ended up the same way, and Stiles was fairly confident that just because he'd picked Lydia up in the middle of the night didn't mean he was going to get something rewarding for his efforts. It sounded cheesy, but being there for her was a reward in itself. Although getting warm and drinking some hot milk seemed pretty rewarding right about now, too.

"Sure, dad," Stiles answered, stress in-tone. He turned to leave once again, however he stopped mid-turn just as Lydia made her way away from them both. Stiles lifted his hand to the large flashlight in his father's right hand, and took it out of his grip swiftly. "I'm gonna need this. Be careful. Its… puke-worthy, trust me."

'Everything's puke worthy to you, Stiles.' Was his humoured response, and then Stiles set off to join Lydia.

It felt better to be moving again, although that also brought pain to his ribs which was far from ideal. In no time, Stiles had caught up to Lydia and was by her side, flashlight in hand, illuminating the path before her so that she could see where she placed her naked feet. Stiles felt bad about that, and if he had the strength and the stamina, he would have carried her home – but he was just too weak to. He wasn't even sure if he could keep his cool doing something like that.

"S-So uh," Stiles began, trying to strike up conversation again. "dunno if you picked up on that super-subtle hint back there but my dad basically gave the O.K for you staying the night." His breath came out in a loud, short huff, as if he was holding it in (which he had been due to nerves). "Its your choice if you wanna, I mean… if you wanna go back home to an empty house that's cool. I'll drive you. But my dad's bed is really huge – wait, that sounds weird.." He shook his head as they travelled the muddy path back to the road again. The conversation died as Stiles bit on his tongue, finding himself too weirded out by his own words to carry on.

The car neared and Stiles was itching to climb back inside. His car might not have been the prettiest girl in the club but she sure as hell could hold her own, and Stiles loved her like a lover. That car got him through a lot of shitty times, and it especially meant a lot since it was previously something that his father adored, too. No one else seemed to appreciate the sheer importance of that light blue jeep and the memories it held besides himself and Scott, but he didn't care. Porches' were overrated and broke down too easily. Jeeps were the way to go.

The time taken for the freezing cold teens to get inside of the car was nearly phenomenal – it was lightning fast how Stiles had given the flashlight to Lydia, searched for his keys in his butt-pocket and had unlocked his car and climbed into the drivers' seat. He slammed the door a bit too forcefully, which made a loud, echoing bang throughout the vicinity, but neither teen cared for that anymore.

The first thing to go on was the heater, and then a small overhead light that illuminated the front of his car nicely. Stiles, finally being able to see Lydia properly now, turned to face her as he pulled his seat belt over his chest. He looked her over; her messy hair, her pale face, her muddy, bare legs… and the sweater she still wore and clung to. He smiled at her faintly as the warmth from the blasting airways warmed his extremities some more, and then he quickly swiped the hat from his hair, and threw it over the back of his seat somewhere. His hair was a total mess; half curled, half crimped tufts of dark cocoa-coloured locks sprang up here and there like he had a sheep skin on his skull, but what was more prominent now in the light was his pale features and the bruise he still adorned. Stiles turned his radio down to a comfortable six on the volume dial and put the car in drive as he spoke to her.

"My place or yours?"

* * *

It didn't take long until Stiles had caught up with her, carrying a flashlight in his hand, which was more than welcome. Now Lydia could actually see where she was putting her feet and possibly avoid cutting her toe on a sharp rock or branch again. "I don't need a babysitter," she simply replied to his rambling about how she could stay overnight if she wanted to. With her arms folded in front of her chest to fight off the cold, she kept walking towards Stiles' jeep in a fast pace. He gave her the flashlight as he was searching for his keys and Lydia just stood there impatiently, her teeth chattering as she waited for him to unlock the damn car. When he did, she wasted no time and climbed into the passenger's seat, turning the flashlight off and tossing it onto the backseat. She resisted the urge to pull her legs to her chest and just curl up into a ball to get warmer as she leaned back, waiting for the heater to come on.

Sleeping at Stiles' place, in the sheriff's room to be exact, was a crazy idea. Sure, she could see where his father was coming from, with Lydia's mother being out of town and all. But Lydia was a big girl, she didn't mind coming home to an empty house after finding a body. Okay, maybe the thought of being alone made her just the tiniest bit uncomfortable, but still, it wasn't like she felt the need to cling to someone right now. She would just take a long, hot shower and then pass out anyway. No company needed for that. And yet, she was still thinking about actually agreeing to staying the night at Stiles' place. With a small sigh, she turned her head sideways to look over at Stiles and frowned immediately as she saw the bruise that covered a good part of his face, now that the light was directly shining on it. She barely noticed that he had finally taken off this ridiculous cap, (only to reveal his ridiculously messy hair) because she was so focused on staring at the bruise. As she realized that he caught her looking at it with big, green eyes, she quickly looked away, biting her lip slightly. "Your hair is such a mess," she commented quietly, a faint smile appearing on her pouty lips. "The longer hair fits you though." It wasn't a lie that she thought he looked better with his long hair as opposed to his short hair a few months back.

Lydia leaned against the window on her right, looking out of it as they were driving out of the forest and back into town. The music on the radio was the only thing that was keeping her awake right now, but she still almost fell asleep. Stiles question startled her and she shuffled in her seat, bringing her hands up to her face and rubbing her eyes. "Your place,"she replied softly, having finally made up her mind, "Just let me grab some fresh clothes first."

* * *

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